of churchmen to civil power were declared to have no scriptural warrant, to be contrary both to the letter and spirit of the original Covenant, which had been subscribed by King James as well as by his subjects, to tend to the re-establishment of Popery, and, in short, to be dangerous to the religion, laws, and liberties of the nation, and no less so to the King's honour. Their loyalty the subscribers to this new bond declared to be unimpeachable, whatever "foul aspersions of rebellion or combination" might be alleged against them by their adversaries. The King's authority was so closely joined with the true worship of God that they must stand or fall together; and as they repudiated all design of doing anything that might turn to the dishonour of God, so did they repudiate all design of doing anything that might turn to the diminution of the King's greatness or authority. "We shall," they swore, "to the uttermost of our power, with our means and lives, stand to the defence of our dread sovereign the King's majesty, his person and authority, in defence and preservation of the foresaid true religion, liberties, and laws of the kingdom; as also to the mutual defence and assistance every one of us of another, in the same cause of maintaining the true religion and his majesty's authority with our best counsel, our bodies, means, and whole power, against all sorts of persons whatsoever; so that whatsoever shall be done to the least of us for that cause, shall be taken as done to us all in general, and to every one of us in particular." This document was the work of Archibald Johnstone of Warriston, a clever, unscrupulous lawyer, and Alexander Henderson, a Presbyterian minister of more learning and temper than most of his party. It was subsequently revised by Rothes, Balmerino, and Loudon, and so took its place in Scottish history as the Covenant of 1638. In all that related to the appointment of churchmen to civil power Napier must have heartily agreed. He had been bred, as Montrose had been bred, in the reformed religion, and was, as Montrose was, a sincere though not intolerant Presbyterian. To a moderate form of Episcopacy, which should be confined strictly to the economy of the Church, he possibly entertained, as many good Presbyterians from the days of Knox had entertained, no aversion. "Bishops," Montrose declared with almost his last breath, "I care not for them. I never intended to advance their interests." That was probably Napier's attitude to them. It did not seem to him a very terrible thing that one clergyman should have the power of regulating the conduct and prescribing the duties of another, whether he was called Bishop or Moderator. But that a clergyman should be entrusted with civil power he thought dangerous to all parties, to King, Church, and State. There still exists in his handwriting a paper bearing emphatic witness to his sentiments on this head.[5] "That churchmen have competency," it begins, "is agreeable to the law of God and man. But to invest them into great estates and principal offices of the State, is neither convenient for the Church, for the King, nor for the State. Not for the Church, for the indiscreet zeal and excessive donations of princes were the first causes of corruption in the Roman Church, the taste whereof did so inflame the avarice and ambition of the successors that they have raised themselves above all secular and sovereign power, and to maintain the same have attended to the world certain devices of their own for matters of faith. Not to Kings nor States, for histories witness what troubles have been raised to Kings, what tragedies among subjects, in all places where churchmen were great. Our reformed Churches, having reduced religion to the ancient primitive truth and simplicity, ought to beware that corruption enter not in their Church at the same gate, which already is open, with store of attendants thereat to welcome it with pomp and ceremony." Nor was he likely to dispute the theory that resistance to innovations dangerous to the peace of the kingdom was compatible with loyalty to the King, and that to preserve the safety of the one was in effect to preserve the authority of the other. "For a King and his people," he wrote, "make up one political body, whereof the King is the head. In a politic as in a natural body what is good or ill for one is so for both, neither can the one subsist without the other, but must go to ruin with the other." Holding these views, and, according to one idea, approving if not actually recommending his brother-in-law's subscription to the Covenant, why, it may be asked, did not Napier himself subscribe it? The answer may perhaps be found in another extract from the same document: "They who are pressed with necessity at home are glad of any occasion or pretext to trouble the public quiet, and to fish in troubled waters to better their fortunes." The snare which lured his young hot-headed relative was spread in vain for the old and cautious Napier. A true Covenanter Montrose called him before the Assembly at Glasgow. He was so; he was too true to the spirit of the real Covenant to be caught by its specious copy; too true a Covenanter to trust himself or his conscience to such keepers as Rothes, Loudon, and Balmerino. A man of his experience in affairs, nor less experienced in the temper of his own countrymen and of the King, cannot but have had a shrewd suspicion whither such a movement under such guides must inevitably tend. It may then be asked why he did not use his influence to dissuade his relative from a partnership he was too prudent himself to join? We do not know that he did not. We know nothing, save that he did not sign the Covenant and that Montrose did. But it is not unreasonable in the circumstances to suppose that his advice may have been given that way, and given in vain. At no time of his life was Montrose easy to persuade against his own feelings. Confident in his own abilities, conscious of his own integrity, why may he not have thought that in him the Covenant would find a leader able to counteract the selfish view of those who were merely troubling the waters to better their own fortune, persuasive enough to guide it into the way it should go, and strong enough to keep it there? And perhaps Napier too believed him to be such a leader.

There remains then only to consider what share, if any, his alleged resentment at the King's behaviour may have had in determining his action. That he joined the Covenant to revenge himself on the King no one who has studied his character will believe, any more than they will believe that he joined the King to revenge himself on the Covenant. But is there anything unreasonable in believing that his resentment at behaviour for which he was conscious of having given no cause, and so much the reverse of what he had every right and reason to expect, may have rendered an ambitious and impulsive young man more amenable to the plausible arguments and misrepresentations of artful and interested counsellors? If the story of Hamilton's intrigue be true—and it is hard to believe there can have been no truth in it—Montrose had been instructed that the King was ill disposed to Scotland, and the Scots had received what he could not but consider a convincing proof of it. With his own eyes he had seen what the King's disposition was to the religion he had been bred in. Everything that had happened since his return to Scotland had unfortunately tended to confirm the original impression of his own reception and Hamilton's explanation of it. A young man of Montrose's disposition would in such a frame of mind be easy game for such cunning hunters as Rothes and his crew. There was nothing in the